The present invention generally relates to digital media and more specifically to techniques for accessing media objects.
With the rapid growth of computers, an increasing amount of information is being stored in the form of electronic (or digital) documents. These electronic documents include media objects that comprise recorded information. The term “recorded information” is used to refer to information that may comprise information of one or more types. The one or more types may be in some integrated form. For example, recorded information may include one or more of text information, graphics information, animation information, video information, and the like. An example of a media object may be an audio file that includes audio information, such as a digital representation of a song.
As music has become digitalized, portable devices that store media objects, such as songs, have been become very popular. The devices allow local storage of a large number of media objects. The user can then play back the media objects using the devices.
Typically, different devices operate independently of each other. For example, a first device is configured to output media objects found on its local storage and a second device is configured to output media objects found on its local storage. Sometimes, it may not be possible to transfer media objects stored locally on one portable device to the other portable device. This may be because digital rights to the media objects do not allow the transfer or the devices are not configured to transfer the media objects. Accordingly, a user that would like to play a media object from another device may need to determine information about the media object (e.g., artist, title, etc.) and information on where to download the media object, and then manually download the media object.